Book Review: The Help

This is the first book review I've ever done, so bear with me! I finished this a few days ago, but I have been grumpy lately so I didn't feel like doing the review. :) But here it goes.

The Help is a book about black maids in Mississippi in the 1960's, and the white women they work for and encounter everyday. The main plot is that Skeeter Phelan, a white woman in her early 20's who just graduated college, wants to be a writer. She gets the idea to write a book from the point of view of 10 or 12 different black maids in the form of interviews, about what it's like to work for white families. She changes all the names of everyone involved. At first, the maids are skeptical, such as Minny and Aibileen, who are the two main maids she starts with. But eventually they agree to the book, and get others to agree as well, and then the focus is on keeping the book a secret, and whether or not it will be a success, and whether or not anyone in Jackson, Mississippi can figure out if the book is about them or not.

I loved this book. I should just leave it at that and have you take my word for it. :) But not only is it very well written and culturally accurate for the time period it's set in, it is very personal to the author's heart. At the end of the book, there is a little bio from Kathryn Stockett about how she grew up in a home with a black maid. That made the story so much more real and personal to the reader (me!).

This book is about racism and civil rights and the complicated relationships between white and black people during the 60's. It is also almost completely about the relationships between women, white or black, and how they change over time. One of my favorite lines from the book, that Kathryn Stockett also mentions again at the end, is "We are just two people. Not that much separates us. Not nearly as much as I'd thought."

I know this isn't very in-depth but eh, I will get better as I do these more. :) Next book on the list: The Hunger Games.